7. June 2011 by admin.

I do not feel as though I have time to catch my breath these days.  The story of the horses of Corbeanca continues with negotiations still taking place. When we know the outcome I will let you know what happens but there is another meeting scheduled with the owner tomorrow and I have now involved Linda Tellington Jones who has come up trumps with a second report and a further valuation of the horses in case the subject of money comes up as it probably will.  I am covering all bases here and hope that we can all come to a resolution that helps the owner, the charity and above all the horses.

In between texts and emails with Raluca, Tony and I managed to get away to London to celebrate the annual Dogs Trust Honours and to watch Emily in a one night performance of a fantastic play called DNA.  Tony helped to direct the production and I really hope that the company get the chance to put it on again. It was brilliant.

I gave another talk on TTouch at the local Hydrotherapy Pool on Sunday in between feeding and mucking out the horses at the farm, saw more new clients in the week and have booked in some other horses that need to come into the farm for a few days.  I did a photo shoot for Your Cat magazine yesterday and also finally managed to take some library pictures of the work on horses for the leaflets and articles that I am in the process of putting together. 

We were going to spend two days working on stock photos with my lovely friend Bob Atkins but he got a last minute booking for a photo shoot with a show jumper so we only had a short time but as it has rained on and off all day it is probably a good thing and we aren’t in any rush.  At least I have been able to catch up a bit more today and locate my passport which had found its way under the bed along with other paperwork from Romania as Tony and I are off to Monte Carlo for a few days at the end of the week.   It is Sight Hound morning tomorrow and I need to finish the article on TTouch for cats before I pack but I am definitely looking forward to a few days away.

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7. June 2011 by admin.

Tony and I spent the morning in Bath celebrating the opening of a great new project in South Gate.  It is called Endangered Madagascar and it has been opened by a friend of ours, Adrian, who is a vet specialising in breeding programmes involving endangered species from Madagascar.  The aim is to highlight the plight of animals in Madagascar and he brought along some divine Streaked Tenrecs, some chameleons, two tortoises, frogs, fresh water crabs and a tarantula.  The animals are obviously not for sale as the project is more of a mini-exhibition even though it is in the shopping centre. They are all well handled and won’t actually live in the shop.  It is well worth a visit if you ever come to Bath. Tony and I fell hopelessly in love with another animal that was there but which wasn’t on show.  She is a baby Lemur and was abandoned by her mother so is being hand raised by Adrian with the help of his own mother.  She is tiny and so, so sweet.  We held her whilst she was fed and I will try to find a picture of us with her but as Tony and I were constantly pulling ‘oooooo’ and ‘aaaaaahhh’ faces I suspect that we will look totally nuts.  If this is the case - the pictures will not be in this blog!

The week has been filled with paper work, a trip to Cornwall to give a talk on TTouch for members of the BVNA, horses, and dogs.  And of course more correspondence with GIA regarding the horses of Corbeanca.  The charity met with the owner in the middle of last week. They told him I had been out and showed him my report.  They were concerned about the meeting but in fact the owner was courteous and thanked Raluca and the other members of the charity for caring for his horses.  He has agreed that he will only take two or three of the better bred mares, and the stallions bar the two that I was working with so this is all good news so far. 

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7. June 2011 by admin.

Tony and I have had a lovely weekend but the horses in Romania are really playing on my mind.  We drove up to Stafford on Saturday to join friends from Over the Rainbow and I spent Sunday working on the yard.

I have written a report on the horses as the charity are now in talks with the owner.  It will not help anyone, least of all the horses, if there is conflict between the parties.  To be fair to the owner, the older mares and some of the stallions are confident and friendly and even though the majority had to be sedated to be moved and were traumatised by the whole experience and obviously extremely mal nourished, he has obviously handled some of them well in the past.

It is my recommendation that the stallions be returned, with a question mark over the two more difficult stallions, and two of the mares. The rest I have suggested remain in the care of the charity.  I cannot imagine that the owner will be able to feed and care for so many neglected horses and whilst I know that this case is symptomatic of equine welfare issues across the globe cannot bear the thought of these horses suffering any more.  It is the star fish story.  Saving even some of the horses will not change the world but it will change the world for those horses that we might be able to help.   

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7. June 2011 by admin.

I am home and thoroughly and utterly exhausted.  My last two days in Romania were spent working with dogs in the care of GIA and another charity.  We were based at the Ringstar Club, a large dog training school in Bucharest owned by Robert Caraman, and Steve Goward from Dogs Trust had flown out on the Tuesday to join me.  I love working with Steve and we had a wonderful time teaching the participants on the two day course clicker training, body language and stress responses in dog, and TTouch body work.  We had a mixture of trainers, shelter helpers and a vet on the course and had a wonderful time.  The weather was amazing and the dogs totally changed of course which stunned the participants as we deliberately kept each practical session short.  The charities in Romania have so many dogs in their care that the prospect of working with them all can be a little overwhelming.  But with a few TTouches here, and a short clicker training session there, the dogs overcame so many issues so quickly it was clear that it doesn’t take hours of individual attention to make a difference to an animal’s life.

Sadly, on the last afternoon we had some terrible news.   The owner of the horses, who had not been heard of for many, many months contacted Raluca out of the blue.  He wanted his horses back and due to complications with the case it looks as though they will all have to be returned.  We were all crushed.  It transpired that the owner had had to leave the country suddenly and did not know what had happened to his horses.   He said he had been sending money for their care and did not know why his horses had been left to starve.  Raluca and I went off to work with a petrified dog in a kennel and spoke at length about the best way forward. Aside from this devastating turn of events, the trip was a huge success and I will be going back.  There is too much to write and so many outstanding moments I cannot share them all but two things were said to me that I think sum up this extraordinary work.

Raluca told me that she had woken up on the Wednesday morning after our two days with the horses and had to call her friend (who had also been with us at the barn).  She said she had to ask her friend whether or not she had actually seen what she thought she had seen.  Was it really true that a miracle had taken place and all the horses had changed?  Or had she just dreamt it all?  She also couldn’t believe that she had stood in the stable with the nervous stallions and watched him eat grass from her hands.

A lovely dog trainer named Bogdan had wanted to experience what the TTouches felt like and when I finished working on is his back he said ‘it is a soft touch but it resonates through the whole body’.  Perfect.  As was virtually every single moment of my time in Romania. 

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7. June 2011 by admin.

I started in the stallion block this morning and the stallion in the first box settled as soon as I walked in. Within a short space of time he started stretching his neck out to investigate the strange white sticks in my hand and within a very short space of time he felt confident to approach me and sniff my hands.  I began to touch him around his head.  When I had been working with the mares I had been given the customary strange and dismissive looks from some of the men that worked with the liveries but when they saw me touch the first stallion their eyebrows raised and they gave me the thumbs up.  It can be very satisfying converting the sceptics!

While I was working with the first stallion I hadn’t really registered that the barn was quieter than it had been the day before.  It was only when I walked down to the end of the block to work with the bigger stallion that I noticed that the snorting had subsided.  Even though I had only spent time in the stable mucking him out there was already a discernable change in this magnificent horse.  He was still too wary to approach me but he didn’t throw himself around the stable the moment I walked in.  His eyes were not as wide and he barely blew through his nose at all.

We gave him a break and went out to the land surrounding the stable yards to collect long, sweet, fresh spring grass.  When we returned with our offerings, the first stallion was calm enough to eat straight from our hands.  The second was too worried to approach me so I stood outside his stable and offered him a huge handful avoiding direct eye contact with him.  He looked at me, then looked away, looked again, paused then walked hesitantly towards me stretching out his neck as far as he good to sniff the grass I held in my hand.  Then he took some and shot over to the far wall to eat.  This was a huge step for him and I could have danced with joy.

Raluca and other helpers from GIA went to pick more fresh grass and we continued working with the mares and the stallions as we had the day before.  By the end of the morning, all the horses could be touched bar the last stallion but I was able to go into his stable and hand feed him which was a massive step forward.  I put head collars on the mares that couldn’t be handled prior to my visit and we wormed a lot of them too.  We groomed them, fed them delicious grass and more carrots, and I showed Raluca and a great young lad who has been working for the charity for the past two weeks how to continue. Even though Raluca is scared of horses she too was able to walk up to the first stallion in his stable and hand feed him.  It was then that I was told the two stallions had been called Pit Bulls as everyone had been terrified of them!

I hadn’t had time to work with all the stallions and there was another one that was quite nervous and hadn’t been touched  so planned to work with him in the afternoon  but as I was hand feeding the more traumatised so called ‘pit bull’ I heard my name and  left my new friend to see what was happening.  There was the lad, stroking the other nervous stallion all over the neck and head.  I don’t know whose smile was the broadest - his or mine.

The time went too quickly and I wished I could have spent the rest of the week with the horses.  I had started teaching some of the mares to lead using a thin, light line slipped through their head collars and moving them quietly around their stall and would have loved to progress to taking them outside but with so many horses to help time was not on my side. Having written that though, it was incredible just how far each horse came in the time that I was with them.   It is impossible to write about each and every horse as it would bore you all rigid and make this blog far too long but to cut a long story short, one dark grey nervous mare who had to hide behind her more confident friend could be approached directly and groomed for the first time ever, another youngster who was skittering around her box and kicking out when people walked past her stable on that first morning was walking straight up to us with bright soft eyes the moment we undid the stable door and another mare whose heart was visibly pounding when I first went into to work with her loved every moment of the soft, gentle TTouch work I could do all over her head, neck and back.  It was an amazing, moving and incredible two days.

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7. June 2011 by admin.

I am now in Romania and have spent the day working with several neglected and traumatised horses in a village called Corbeanca.   Twenty eight horses were taken into care by a charity called GIA.  They had in effect been abandoned by their owner and the majority of them are still desperately underweight, even though they have been in the care of the charity for several months.   In all there are 11 stallions and 17 mares and when I first walked into the barn where the mares are stabled it was almost impossible to know where to start.

I began with the most scared of the horses and went from mare to mare with two wands.  They ranged in age from weanlings up to one elderly girl who is in her late teens but the toll on their bodies from being left to starve in the dark for several months made them all look far older than their years.  For some it was challenging to have me standing in the door way, gently moving the wands in the air.  For just a few minutes at a time I stood quietly in the doorway, whistling softly and slowly drawing the outline of their bodies with the wands from a distance to accustom them to my presence and the movement of the wands.  Then I would quietly shut the door and move to the next stable.  Others could be stroked on the underside of their neck with one wand whilst I held the other wand out to give the horse a visual barrier.  With all I gave them plenty of room to move (well as much as the small block stables would allow).  Through the course of the morning I went from box to box, and each time I could get a little nearer every mare without the horse panicking and trying to climb up the walls.  I paid great attention to both the body language of the horse and my own.

I explained to Raluca that I was looking for a minute softening of the eye, or a flick of the ear in my direction, a lowering of the head, a sigh and gentle mouth movements or perhaps an escalation of stress behaviours such as licking the walls, widening or hardening of the eye, the small muscle twitches under the bottom lid, holding of the breath, turning the head away, lifting a foreleg or standing with a hind limb up, ready to kick out in fear.

Raluca had told me that she had a high expectation of what I would achieve when she met me at the airport and I wondered in those first few hours whether she was feeling disappointed.  Of course I have faith in the power of TTouch but sometimes it can appear that very little is happening if you are watching the work up close for the very first time.

We had arrived at the stables armed with delicious carrots but some horses were too scared to eat.  Others would approach provided we were outside the stalls but snatch the food before shooting back to their ’safe place’.  I put this in inverted commas because in reality I do not believe that these horses had ever felt safe.

As I worked on through the afternoon I pointed out all the improvements that were happening in front of our eyes. It looked as though magic had been dancing in the air.  And Raluca could see it too. But it isn’t just the visual information that lets you know something extraordinary is occurring.  If you have ever worked in this type of situation before you will know how it feels when the energy starts to shift.  There is a peace that begins to flow from animal to animal as they begin to settle.  Sometimes it is subtle but as the day wore on it became more tangible. It was so obvious that you could almost hear it.  Eyes that were wide with fear began to soften and look brighter.  The banging from some of the mares that had been kicking out as people were walking up and down the aisle subsided and the fast, panicked movements of the horses when they were being fed and watered dissipated and were replaced by calm.  Instead of being frozen in their corners they began to move quietly around their stables to watch me through the bars as I worked with each of their friends.

By the end of the day I could stroke every mare over some part of her body with either one wand or two. I showed Raluca some body TTouches on the older, more confident mares and could start doing TTouches on  the necks and faces of many more.  The majority of the mares were walking over to me when I entered their stables and could stand munching quietly on the carrots that I offered. The snatching had gone and there was a wonderful sense of ease in the barn.  We finished with the mares and moved to the stallion block and it was then that my heart almost broke.  The first box was inhabited by a dappled grey stallion.  He was standing on almost a foot of muck and his water bucket was crushed against the wall.  I could not see how this poor creature could even drink and the stench of ammonia filled the air.

Even though Raluca has little experience of horses she was as horrified as I was.  When we spoke to the two people that were meant to feed and care for the horses they told Raluca that they were scared of this stallion.  They didn’t dare enter his box and I understand why.   The horse was muscled and quite well covered, unlike the mares, but his fear levels were far greater than any of the horses in the other barn.  When he even saw people, never mind heard the door open, he would throw himself around the stable, kicking out and crashing around the wooden stable in blind panic and as the care takers were also petrified and therefore rushed in their movements it was an accident waiting to happen.  I had spent so long with the mares that we had almost run out of time but I couldn’t leave him in his dirty stall.  I went in with my two trusty wands and followed the same steps that I had with the mares. 

Within minutes I could stand in the stable holding the wands with my arms outstretched to provide a movable barrier in which to keep the horse quiet and although it was not safe to touch him, this magnificent horse began to settle and lower his head.  I assured everyone that he would not hurt them and they took turns to dig out the mess. A new water bucket was found and hung on the wall and wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow of fresh bedding was laid on the floor.  Throughout the time it took to change his entire bed, save for the patch he was standing on, this stallion never once tried to kick out.  He watched what we were doing and this alone enabled people to see him with new eyes. I think, in those moments, he began to see us in a different light too.

As we were working in the first stable I could hear the stallion at the end of the block. He was continually blowing through his nose in fear.  Every moment was punctuated by snorting and when I walked down the aisle to see him I could see the whites of his eyes even though it was pretty dark. He was even worse than the first but again, I went in to see if I could keep him settled so that we could muck him out too.  And we did.  Weeks and weeks of filthy bedding was removed and as it was getting late I promised Raluca that we would start with the stallions the following day.

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7. June 2011 by admin.

It was an early start today as I was filming with my good friend Karen Walsh in Ealing.  The client is a highly entertaining lady who lives with her daughter and two Yorkshire terriers and there is canine conflict in the house!  The smaller Yorkie named Fearless Fred launches many an attack on the very tolerant Captain Scarlett.  Many people fall into the trap of believing the antagonist to be the ‘dominant’ dog but this is incorrect. ( And, oh, is the word ‘dominant’ so over used).  I hear it so often in relation to all animals (but primarily horses and dogs) and it is usually misunderstood.

It is a common belief that the dominant animal is pushy and controlling and wants things to be on their terms but actually the true dominant dog if you want to use that word is usually pretty easy going and rarely engages in conflict.  The leader knows full well that it can have any resource it wants if it wants it.  It doesn’t need to throw its weight around and guard everything in sight nor be the first to eat, drink etc.  It knows the difference between a real and a perceived threat and will act according and appropriately.  It isn’t driven by fear and insecurity and will take action if, and only if, it is necessary.  It is in essence a very calm and confident animal that usually has good social skills as well.  The mouthy, vocal, pushy, reactive animal that is usually labelled as dominant is generally extremely insecure.  It is no different to the playground bully who picks on weaker children in a bid to feel better about him/herself.  And Fearless Fred was a classic example of this misunderstanding.

Fearless Fred is jealous of any attention given to Captain Scarlett.  He becomes reactive if Captain Scarlett is petted, is fed, or plays with toys.  And when the door bell goes it is mayhem.  If you believe certain trainers who tell you the dog is dominant you might then believe that attention re-enforces dominant tendencies and it is therefore far better to ignore all the unwanted behaviour in a bid to re assert your own ‘dominance’ or roll the dog onto the floor to up your own status.  This is another huge problem in dog training trends and again a big mistake as dogs do not roll other dogs.  The lower ranking dog is the one that actually drops to the ground - it isn’t rolled by the other dog at all. Many dogs roll onto their backs when concerned about situations which is why some people are bitten when they then reach down to tickle the dogs tummy as they think this is what the dog is wanting.  In fact the dog is trying to diffuse what it deems to be a threatening situation and if we continue with our own behaviour the dog is left with very little choice but to bite.  The dog is labelled and so the cycle continues.  Insecure dogs are usually sensitive to contact around the neck and hindquarters (again this leads to mislabelling and the dominant word creeps in as the dog may react when touched on the neck or taken by the collar) and Fearless Fred was no exception.  I spent some time working gently on his body and popped a Thundershirt on him as well (brilliant product) to help him overcome his body sensitivity.  His eyes softened, he relaxed and fell asleep.

I also wanted to do some clicker training with both Fearless Fred and Captain Scarlett.  Captain Scarlett was brilliant and loved the clicker training.  I showed his owner some body work for Captain Scarlett too. We worked with him for ages and all the time Fearless Fred just watched from his sofa with soft eyes and a really relaxed expression on his face.  Although Captain Scarlett was being given Fearless Fred’s favourite treats and having one to one attention from their owner, Fearless Fred wasn’t bothered in the slightest.  Their owner was stunned.  When the doorbell rang, Fearless Fred jumped off the sofa and yapped a couple of times and Captain Scarlett didn’t budge.  Another jaw dropping moment for the owner and yet another satisfying session for me.

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